What a Month!

Oof! February was one roller coaster of a month! I went from the highs of going on vacation to the lows of... well, a lot of stuff, and a lot of craziness in between! And today was a day to beat them all. I can't even pinpoint what exactly went wrong today. It was a lot of little things that just had me feeling in a low mood, but I had plans for tonight that I was really excited about until the day started pecking at that, too.

I was supposed to be going to a worship CD recording at one of our church campuses. Originally it was going to be an outing for our small group. One by one people started backing out until it was just going to be me and Amy. Not that I have a problem with that. Amy and I have had an adventure or two on our own and it's high time we through some Jesus adventures in there, too. Until she got a last minute notice that she needed to drive her stepson halfway across the state this evening. If you're unaware, Tennessee is kind of a long state. Needless to say, she was out. At that point I was almost ready to throw in the towel and decide not to go, but I had invited a girl who was interested in joining our small group and she seemed really excited about going. Plus I had already asked Greg about going and he has really been wanting to go see more live music. Okay, okay, we're going!

Oh em gee oh es aytch (OMGOSH), I am so glad I didn't talk myself out of going! I had a fabulous time singing my heart out and worshiping with a few hundred other believers. It. Was. Awesome. I sang, I cried, I danced, I prayed... I feel refreshed! The feeling of being with so many other believers singing and praising together was just amazing. I can't wait til the CD is ready for purchase. I couldn't even tell you my favorite song we sang because I loved them all. Although, they did a mix of one with Can't Hold Us by Macklemore and I was quite excited. And the girl interested in joining our small group got to see what is probably the closest rendition of the "real" me that anyone has seen in a long time. God bless her if she decides to come to group!

Anyway, since I didn't even try to record any of tonight's concert, I will leave you with a song that all ways makes me happy. They play this on Air1 on Monday afternoons, saying that it's impossible to be mad and listen to this song. Well, I don't know if it's impossible, but it does always make me dance... and I don't typically like this type of music! Have a great day!

Take 2

Yesterday I downloaded the Blogger app to my phone I wrote a long lovely post about some personal struggles and my future goals. When I had just finished typing and was proof reading before posting my phone rang. And of course the app didn't have auto-save, so I lost the whole post. I was so bummed! And now I don't even remember exactly what I said. So, I'll just fill you in on what's going on. 

Yesterday I had sort of a mini-meltdown... Ok, if you ask G, not so mini. I got home from a stressful day at work and when I went to change out of my uniform I realized that I only have one pair of jeans that fit. I'm sorry, what? I don't really have many "regular" clothes anyway, so realizing that I only have one pair of non-workout pants was kind of devastating. And realizing that they don't fit because I gained weight was doubly devastating. That's the problem when your daily attire consists of yoga pants. Its easy not to notice your expanding waist. 

I will take full responsibility for my weight gain. I mean, who else could I blame? My eating habits have been absolutely terrible lately and I have not tracked my food regularly since sometime last summer. And over the past few months I have become more and more miserable at work... and since I work at my gym, I couldn't stomach the thought of going when I didn't have to be there. Needless to say that hasn't helped my waistline. 

Last night I decided that today would be Day 1 of calorie counting (again). And I weighed myself for the first time in months. I wasn't too happy with myself, weighing in at 223.8. I had gotten down to 201! It hurt my heart. But I did it before and I can do it again. At least I caught myself before I got back up to 250! Today I just focused on counting everything I ate. I want to start meal planning and making sure that I am eating enough of the right kinds of foods (lean proteins, fruits/veggies, etc.), but that will have to wait until I get my next paycheck and can buy the appropriate stuff. Today was just about the accountability of tracking everything that went into my mouth. It was a bit annoying having to stop to record everything I ate, but I knew if I didn't do it I wouldn't remember at the end of the day. I didn't do too bad. As a matter of fact I stayed well under "budget," even though hormones* were making me feel slightly hollow.

As for working out... I'm working on it. I'm trying to get G to take up an activity with me. He already works out 4-5 days a week and plays in a tennis league. He's caught between being open to the idea and figuring out when the heck would we fit it in. He is friends with the couple that owns one of the local dance studios, Dance Tonight, so I thought I might try to get him to start there. They have newcomer classes on Friday nights and a dance party afterward to show off/practice the moves you just learned. I think even if we can do that once a month it will help me and benefit us a couple (after 5 years of the same dates, we need to freshen things up a bit). Win-win! And it might spur me on to try other activities I hadn't considered before. I just need to so something! 

Anyway, right now what I need to do is sleep! That's important to a healthy diet, too, right??

*That would explain the not-so-mini-meltdown...

Stressed Fractured Heart

That may seem melodramatic, but it's not I tell you! Seriously though,  I just spent 20 minutes writing  a blog update on my phone... then G called and it all disappeared. It didn't help that my post was kind of a venting about my current stress level, and then disappeared like so much vapor.

Oh well,  I can write it again. Just not tonight.

Weekly Update

I looked at my blog before I started typing and realized my last post was a week ago. At least it's better than I had been doing! Actually, that's a little encouraging when I think about my Book List. I finished The Giver in a day and then started on the Hobbit... which feels like it is taking me for.ev.er to read. I'm almost done with it though! I will probably finish it tomorrow. I don't know what book I'll read after that. Not the Lord of the Rings though... I'm not ready for that. ;-)

I'm getting pretty excited for my trip! Ok, I've been excited since we booked it way back in October, but now it's getting real! Greg is letting me borrow his big suitcase and carry-on for the trip. I picked up the suitcase last night (he's using the carry-on for a business trip to Florida this weekend), and I already started packing!

It looks like I packed more than I actually have lol

One of the many great benefits of going to the Bahamas in February is that most of the clothes I'm packing are not in regular rotation right now. It felt a little odd digging out my shorts and flip-flops when it was 13 degrees earlier today! I think I have everything I need for the trip. Amy and I went shopping on Monday night and split the cost of some to the items we can share like shampoo, soap, room snacks/drinks, etc. Somehow that made this trip a little more real. :-D

In other news, I am currently in the midst of a 21-day prayer fast with my church. We fast corporately a few times a year, and I always learn new things about myself and my relationship with God in the process. I wouldn't say it's fun necessarily, but it is beneficial. My church supports all sorts of fasting; total fast, Daniel fast, media fast, whatever. This time I decided I'd give up all meat except seafood. So far I've learned that I'm ok not having meat, but I don't like meal planning. I think that's where my real sacrifice lies! But I use that time as a prayer reminder so it's all good. However, on Monday the Lord told me to add something else to my fast.

I just want to take a minute to say that when I say the Lord told me to do something, I don't mean that I heard a booming voice in the heavens or an angel appeared before me. It's hard to explain exactly how I know when God tells me to do something, I just know. It's a kind of conviction and certainty that I can't quite explain. Anyway, back to my fast...

Apparently, I'm not allowed to complain/whine/wallow for the rest of my fasting time. That is definitely harder than going without meat. I hate to admit it, but I have gotten into such a habit of texting Amy or Greg when someone makes me angry or annoyed. And it's not to vent so I can move on, it's to get them to agree with me and validate my irritation. And sometimes I will sit and stew in the negativity until everything makes my skin crawl. So I have to stop. That's not to say that I can't speak up when something is seriously wrong or that I can't let people know I've had a rough day, I'm just not allowed to rehash it a million times. I think this will also help me reclaim my joy in 2014. Is it odd that I'm kind of looking forward to the struggle?

The Giver

I’m off to a good start with my reading list! After I typed up my list I looked to see what I could get from the R.E.A.D.S. website. I was surprised to see the Giver was immediately available so I downloaded it and started reading right away (it surprised me because it was recently announced that it will be a movie later this year). 

This book has been recommended to me several times via the “you read this, you may like this” sections on Kindle. Apparently they know what they are doing, because I read it in less than 10 hours. It’s a pretty short book, only 204 pages, but still.  

The Giver centers around Jonas, a twelve year old boy living in a seemingly ideal world. However, when he is given his life assignment as the Receiver he begins to realize the dark secrets of his fragile community. It was recommended to me after reading the Hunger Games and Divergent. Good book, I recommend it. If you enjoyed those,  you should check this one out. As is usually the case when an adult reads a children’s book, it made me think about things a little differently.  

Right now I am eagerly waiting for my friend Leah to let me know the gender of her baby. She held a gender reveal dinner with her fiancee's family and is supposed to let the rest of us know after the dinner. She told me when she found out she was pregnant that she wanted a boy, but I'm fairly positive she'll be ecstatic either way. I hope she posts something soon! The suspense is killing me! :-)

Bibliophile

With my upcoming vacation (23 days and counting!), my brain keeps yelling at me that I need books for my trip. I don't know what it is about a vacation that makes me want to read, but it's the trend. I was telling Amy about my predicament, and she told me to to go for it and we could allocate 40% of our time for reading. You don't have to tell me twice! But that started the cycle of looking through my book pins on Pinterest and jotting down authors and titles that I've wanted to read... 40+ titles later I have a list of books I want to read. Needless to say I'm not planning to take all of them on vacation with me. I decided to keep a running list here on the blog so I can remember what I wanted to read. If I try to read all of them this year, I'll average about one every 9 days. Which actually seems feasible. I'm not making it a challenge because we all know I fail in epic proportions at those. But I would like to spend more time in books and less time doing nothing, i.e. mindlessly browsing social media. Nothing against Facebook personally, but I never seem to get anything productive out of it. At least Pinterest provides me with recipes and book recommendations. :-)

I'm not sure if I'm more excited about my book list or my vacation. Amy and I need to go shopping for our shared items like shampoo and toothpaste. We're entering that phase where I can't really believe that I'm about to go on vacation. This is what happens when I plan trips more than a month in advance; by the time the trip arrives I've been planning it so long I don't know what else to do! the correct answer is start planning another one. Maybe G and I can go some place interesting this year, like a theme park or something. We haven't taken a trip since August 2011, which is far too long to my poor little soul.

*For the record, no, Amy and I will not be spending 40% of our vacation reading... it will be 30%, max.

Sick days

Ok, so I thought I just needed to rest. I thought I had a measly little cold and needed to sleep it off. Nope. Turns out I have the flu. Yay! I haven't had the flu in like 12 years so I kind of forgot what the symptoms felt like. But after sleeping for almost 36 hours, I decided to have Mr. W drive me to the clinic to get checked out. They decided to do a flu test, and when the doctor came back in wearing a mask I knew it was positive. She prescribed me cough medicine, a Z-Pack, and an inhaler. The Z-Pack and inhaler are to help combat the bronchitis that is know to hit those with asthma when they get the flu. Awesome x2! She also gave me a sick note through Friday. Part of me is sorely tempted to use it, but I don't have the personal time to take a week off now when I'm also leaving for the Bahamas in 30 days(!!!) so we'll see. I'm forbidden to go back to work until I'm fever-free for 24 hours so that may make my decision for me.

I'd like to say I'm doing pretty well with my resolutions so far. I wouldn't even be lying if I did say it! My main resolution is to get more organized this year, and I've done ok. G gave me a journal for Christmas, and I've been using it to make to-do lists. Putting my tasks in writing seems to be helping me focus. Some of my tasks have been put on hold this week, but I'm hoping to go back at it this weekend. One thing I really, really, REALLY need to focus on is my meal planning. I found a few planners on Pinterest, now just to put them into action!

Ok, my cough syrup is kicking in, and I'm starting to get loopy. Enjoy the rest of your Tuesday!